


darkness rises, and light to meet it

by politicalmamaduck



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Jedi Academy (Star Wars), Alternate Universe - Role Reversal, Dark Side Rey (Star Wars), F/M, Force Bond (Star Wars), Jedi Ben Solo, Post-Star Wars: The Last Jedi, Rey is a Palpatine (Star Wars), Suicidal Thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-14
Updated: 2021-02-14
Packaged: 2021-03-15 14:48:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,300
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29066094
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/politicalmamaduck/pseuds/politicalmamaduck
Summary: After the throne room, Jedi Ben Solo and Kira Ren meet again a year later.
Relationships: Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 11
Kudos: 25
Collections: To Find Your Kiss: The Reylo Fanfiction Anthology's Valentine's Day Exchange





	darkness rises, and light to meet it

**Author's Note:**

  * For [czechia](https://archiveofourown.org/users/czechia/gifts).



> Written for czechia in the 2021 Reylo Fanfiction Anthology St. Valentine's Day exchange, To Find Your Kiss! I couldn't resist a post-TLJ role reversal AU among their prompts. Thank you for the excellent prompts, and I hope you enjoy this!

“I don’t want to keep fighting you, Ben.” She swung away from his strike, taking steps back and away, her cloak twirling behind her. The distance between them was too close, yet not close enough. 

Despite the sweat on her brow and her closed, tensed, fighting posture, Rey’s eyes were wide and honest. He could feel her opening herself to him in the Force just as he could feel his racing heartbeat. When he closed his eyes and meditated, he could see the light shining through the cracks in her armor of darkness, just as he could feel it through their bond. 

“So why are we fighting, Rey?” He would not use her other name. He could not. 

“Because you won’t join me. You didn’t take my hand when I offered it to you. I offered you the whole galaxy, Ben.”

“I don’t want the whole galaxy, Rey. You should know that by now, you and Snoke, or your grandfather, rather. I’m not like my mother, or my uncle.”

_Even though they so badly wanted me to be like them._

_I failed them_ , he couldn’t help but thinking, the constant refrain in the back of his mind. 

_Just as I failed you, Rey. I’m so sorry._

As quickly as he felt her opening herself to him, he felt her pulling away once more. Her mental shields went up, shutting him out.

“What do you want, Ben?” Her voice betrayed her frustration, her eyes flashed with anger. 

When did anyone ever ask him what he wanted? He couldn’t remember. What did he want?

Since she returned to his life, she haunted his dreams. He could feel the light within her, just as well as he knew the darkness inside himself. He wanted to help her find the balance for which he’d struggled for so long. 

He didn’t say that, but he still answered honestly. “Just you,” he said, his shoulders slumping with exhaustion. He deactivated his lightsaber and took a step towards her. 

This time, it was Ben Solo who extended his hand to Rey--Kira Palpatine Ren, Master of the Knights of Ren--and hoped that she would take it, that she would listen to the light within her rather than Snoke’s lies, her grandfather’s poison. 

* * *

_One year ago_

“Still, that fiery spit of passion! You always did have your father’s heart and your mother’s hope, Ben Solo.” 

He ignored Snoke’s taunt, instead focusing his vision on Rey. His Rey. Her back was to Snoke, her eyes looked down upon him, kneeling upon the throne room floor. 

He couldn’t move--Snoke’s grip on him was too strong--but he tried to keep his breathing even, his demeanor calm, despite the situation. Despite the taunts, the pressure, the hate flowing through the room. 

“And because of that you must die.” 

Ben did not react. He kept his eyes on Rey. She would not kill him. He trusted her, trusted their bond. He breathed, and centered himself in the Force the way his uncle taught him.

“My worthy apprentice, daughter of darkness, heir apparent to Emperor Palpatine, where there was conflict I now sense resolve, where there was weakness, strength. Complete your training and fulfill your destiny.” 

Rey met his eyes. Her fingers twitched.

Across the throne room, a lightsaber ignited, impaling Snoke on its blade. 

Ben felt freer than he had in years, his body and mind unburdened by an interloper’s weight. 

The lightsaber flew into his hand, and he turned to meet the Praetorian Guard, Rey at his back.

He could feel her heat, her passion, her anger. 

The first Guard fell, and their deadly dance began. 

When she striked, he parried. Where one was weak, the other strong. 

The Force flowed through them, surrounding them and binding them with an indelible embrace. 

When they returned to themselves, all of the Praetorian Guard lying lifeless on the floor, Ben was empty where just moments before he was full of Rey’s presence, her spirit. 

He would spend the next year simultaneously chasing and avoiding her--her comms, her ambushes, her intrusions into his dreams. 

A Force bond was a dangerous thing for a Jedi. 

* * *

“What happened that night at the Academy, Rey?”

Ben wasn’t there that night. He was away, on a mission with the Senate on Hosnian Prime. Over the years, his mind played and re-played the different scenarios over and over again. 

_If only I were there_. 

_I could have saved them._

_If only I were there_. 

_I would have died too._

“Didn’t he tell you?”

“Tell me what?”

“The truth about that night, about my heritage. How he lied to me for all those years. It was only a matter of time before the rest of the galaxy found out, he said.” Rey’s voice was bitter, a far cry from the girl Ben once knew, one of his uncle’s most promising apprentices. A little girl, sold into indentured servitude on Jakku. Her story was perhaps all the more heartbreaking for what she became, Ben thought, willing tears not to fall. Yet another promising Jedi turned to an instrument of evil. 

“He decided I was old enough to know the truth. It was better to tell me sooner rather than later, before I started traveling more widely as an apprentice. Someone might notice, might figure it out. We couldn’t have that; we would need to be careful on my missions. My grandfather tried so hard to destroy the Jedi, destroy the light, and Master Luke couldn’t risk that happening again.”

The Rey Ben remembered loved gardening and flowers so much. She always volunteered to help with the kitchen garden, always had dirt under her fingernails. She loved the rain, but hated the cold, and her lightsaber glowed as yellow as a desert sun. 

The woman who stood before him did not have a garden, did not have dirt under her fingernails. She could not feel the rain on a sterile First Order ship, and her lightsaber was a wound, a bloodied and broken kyber crystal reflecting its master all too well. 

_Oh Rey, what have they done to you_? He wanted to scream and shout and rage against the cruel galaxy, as if he were a child once more, a child with a voice in his head and migraines and nightmares he could not escape, could not control. 

He never asked her whose voice she heard, what shape and form her pain and trauma took. Was it Snoke? Was it her grandfather? Was it them both?

He could taste the questions on the tip of his tongue, but he swallowed them for the poison they were. 

“I’m sorry, Rey. Does it help you to know I had a similar experience?” he asked, his traitorous face and voice betraying the vulnerability he shared with her, whether he wanted to or not. 

In a different life, in a different galaxy, perhaps they might have been Master and Padawan. 

In a different life, in a different galaxy, perhaps they might not have been Ben Solo and Rey Palpatine. 

“You at least knew your grandfather was a great Jedi,” she replied. “Death or Dark Side, at least the first part of his story--your story--was true. My own Master didn’t trust me with the truth about my family, and lied to me for years. I wanted so badly to find my family, but I’d never felt so alone.”

Ben nodded. He met her eyes across the fire; its warm glow softened her face, illuminating the shadows. For a moment, looking at Rey, everything was beautiful and soft, and he could forget their pain and the past, and lose himself in her eyes. 

He extended his hand. 

Their fingers met, across space, time, and distance. 

“You’re not alone,” he said.

“Neither are you.”

**Author's Note:**

> Many thanks to my beta boo Desiree as always. Please leave a comment with your thoughts.


End file.
